As Indonesia-based O2O platform Go-Jek prepares itself to officially launch its ride-hailing service in Singapore, it has opened a pre-registration site today for drivers in the city-state to sign up as Go-Jek drivers.
Go-Jek will then contact the interested drivers on how they can join the company’s Singapore platform, when it launches. Unlike other markets where Go-Jek started its ride-hailing services with motorcycles, it will be revving up its engines in Singapore with cars instead, as the law does not currently allow motorcycle taxis to operate in such a way.
Go-Jek’s impending launch in Singapore follows that in Vietnam, where it has set up operations under a local name Go-Viet. In Singapore, and other markets around Southeast Asia, its key competitor is locally-headquartered giant Grab with a massive war-chest ready, boasting investors like Softbank, Toyota, Didi and others. According to Crunchbase data, Grab has raised US$6.1 billion to Go-Jek’s US$2.1 billion. Go-Jek has also been said to be raising a minimum of US$2 billion at a valuation of around US$10 billion.
This highly anticipated entry of Go-Jek into Singapore also comes after a contentious merger between Grab and Uber’s Southeast Asian operations, which took place earlier this year. In September, the Singaporean government ruled the deal as anti-competitive, and fined the two firms a combined total of US$9.5 million.
We have reached out to Go-Jek for more details on the launch.
Editor: Ben Jiang
